1 SKILL TO LEARN
At work, two emotions run high: cortisol and adrenaline. These emotions make people irritable, uncreative, memory impaired, intolerant, and lead to bad decision making. Every time you present, you’re actively trying to get people out of these emotions.
Storytelling is the antidote.
Below are 7 actions you can take to tell better stories.
Write your story first, before switching to slides: Have you ever tried to write an essay one sentence at a time, tabbing to the next page before you could see the whole thing? No. because you’d lose the thread immediately. The same trap exists in decks. When you write directly in slides, you only ever see one slide at a time. You lose the narrative. You lose the flow. And you end up with a story that is, at best, lackluster, and at worst, incoherent. Write and edit in a document first, before you move it to a deck.
Add tension immediately: Margaret Atwood said, “A good story needs a break in pattern recognition.” This is how you grab people’s attention; pulling them away from quietly multitasking on the Zoom call to sitting up and actually listening to you. For example, “Your brand is doing great and really doesn’t need to do anything differently” is a sedative. Likewise, “Your brand is the best in the world. Or at least, that’s what your clients are telling you...” is a different thing entirely. It grabs attention. It makes people want to listen to hear where the story will go.
Make it specific. It is in the specific that you find the universal. The best novels, movies, TV shows, and advertisements know specificity makes work feel human. It gives people something to latch onto. An insight that hits on a precise human truth lands harder than a general platitude. A persona that paints a vivid picture of a real person—her name, her morning routine, the thing that keeps her up at night—does more work than a demographic chart ever could.
Tease the ending: Hint at where the story is going at the beginning. This is a popular trick with journalists. When the first sentence of your story and the last sentence contain echos of each other people are convinced of their brilliance. It makes them feel smart. It makes them feel like it was their idea.
Release positive emotions: Dopamine, oxytocin, and endorphins are three powerful emotions you want your audience to experience, and they are easy to trigger. You create dopamine by building suspense and creating cliffhangers, which increases focus, motivation, and memory. You create oxytocin by showing vulnerability and creating moments of empathy, which builds trust and makes people root for you. And you create endorphins by making people laugh, which helps people relax, become more open, and think more creatively. You can learn more about this by watching David JP Phillips Ted Talk.
Shorten It: Short sentences. Small words. Cut fluff. Bella Fordyce of Google wrote a great piece about this.
WRITE: Journal in the morning. Write short stories. Craft essays about things you love.
There are many different narrative structures you can apply these tips to. Freytag’s Pyramid. The three-act structure. The hero’s journey. The snowflake method. Countless others. Understand them and try them out to find the best fit for you.
I’ve found Freytag’s Pyramid works best for most strategic narratives.
Exposition: Background and the big problem
Rising action: What’s happening that adds nuance to the problem
Climax: The unlock helps us solve the problem (aka, the insight)
Falling action: The strategy that solves the problem
Denouement: How it comes to life
🌟 At the bottom of this post are the 5 essential resources to make you the best storyteller in the room. Paid subscribers only 🌟
1 ACTION TO TAKE
Let’s use the narrative above to write a 5-part story. for this exercise, we will use Aesop, but if you’re working on your own project, swap that in.
Ask: Aesop wants to increase sales of their pet wash.
Exposition: What is the background? What is the problem behind the ask?
Aesop has invested in creating a luxury pet wash that gently cleanses, deodorizes, and soothes skin. As pets have become family members, the profit potential has exploded. Aesop sees pet care as a natural extension of its brand and an opportunity to grow basket size. But consumers don’t naturally think of Aesop, a luxury brand, when they think of pet care.
Rising action: What’s happening that adds nuance to the problem?
The majority of premium pet brands (e.g., Farmers Dog, Wild One, and Furbo) only sell pet products. Aesop, by contrast, is a skincare brand entering a category where it lacks the same credibility and mental availability. At the same time, premium pet care is becoming increasingly crowded as brands rush to capitalize on the humanization of pets. Consumers may be willing to spend more on their animals, but they don’t necessarily expect a skincare company to suddenly become a pet expert.
Climax: What is the insight?
Aesop’s human-first perspective isn’t a disadvantage. It’s exactly what makes them credible. As pets become family, the standards we have for ourselves increasingly extend to them.
Falling action: What is the strategy that will leverage the insight to solve the problem?
Position Aesop Pet Care as bringing Aesop’s standards of care to every member of the household.
Denouement: How will this work come to life?
Awareness
Launch at the Westminster Dog Show as the official grooming partner. Create content in the same style beauty brands use to showcase celebrity red-carpet looks
OOH near flagship stores, dog-friendly neighborhoods, and dog parks
Paid social
PR and earned media
Partnerships with premium groomers
Consideration
Direct mail to existing Aesop customers
Creator partnerships
Paid social retargeting
Paid search
In-store sampling
Conversion
Sales associates trained to sell Pet Care
In-store dog events
Prominent in-store merchandising
1 QUOTE TO INSPIRE
“The most powerful person in the world is a storyteller.” -Steve Jobs
